"It might be more accurate to say that it occurred to him to do so; in a split-second, with no accompanying language, except maybe a very quiet internal 'Yes.'
"He just liked it better that way, for reasons he couldn’t articulate, and before he’d had the time or inclination to articulate them.
"An artist works outside the realm of strict logic."
...
"The artist, in this model, is like the optometrist, always asking: Is it better like this? Or like this?
"The interesting thing, in my experience, is that the result of this laborious and slightly obsessive process is a story that is better than I am in 'real life' – funnier, kinder, less full of crap, more empathetic, with a clearer sense of virtue, both wiser and more entertaining.
"And what a pleasure that is; to be, on the page, less of a dope than usual."

The Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution protects Americans from random and arbitrary stops and searches.
According to the government, however, these basic constitutional principles do not apply fully at our borders.

useful + also there's big azz infographic w/ tiny text
"
1. We don’t see everything. Some of the information we filter out is actually useful and important.
2. Our search for meaning can conjure illusions. We sometimes imagine details that were filled in by our assumptions, and construct meaning and stories that aren’t really there.
3. Quick decisions can be seriously flawed. Some of the quick reactions and decisions we jump to are unfair, self-serving, and counter-productive.
4. Our memory reinforces errors. Some of the stuff we remember for later just makes all of the above systems more biased, and more damaging to our thought processes.
"

“High school was bliss for me,” DuBuc said recently. “I tried not to dwell on the stuff that wasn’t good.” But, as she was about to start her freshman year at Western Michigan University, she got a call from a close childhood friend, Victoria, who asked, “Did you know you’re on the public sex-offender registry?”

...

The [Texas sex offender treatment] plan also included a monthly polygraph ($150) and a computerized test that measured how long his eyes lingered on deviant imagery ($325). He would also have to submit to a “penile plethysmograph,” or PPG. ... Metts would be billed around $200 per test.

...

The prosecutor pushed for two years in prison... Metts’s attorney urged alternatives that would be less costly for taxpayers. None of Metts’s violations, he noted, had any connection to the original charges of sexual assault of a child. A typical mistake was failing to charge his ankle bracelet’s battery. The judge took some time to think it over. The next morning, she sentenced Metts to ten years in prison.

the prob w/ 3-party ish depending on this conditional spread: "the voting paradox of cyclical societal preferences implies that the election has no Condorcet winner: no candidate who can win a one-on-one election against each other candidate."

"This is the system that we’ve inherited. But here’s the rub. A larger and larger proportion of the American population of all colors is slipping from comfortable middle class status to a state of reduced circumstances. Many of the folks who always believed they could buy their way in to the better places are now finding themselves in the lesser environments – the kinds of situations they were happy to impose on others in the past. And they’re really pissed off about it."

"There are four basic elements in my approach, which support a parent being calmly and confidently in charge. The first is attachment and connection... The second is … parenting from strength, rather than neediness and desperation.. The third is helping kids handle frustration so that it doesn’t turn into anger and aggression... And finally, I teach parents to stay cool and calm, rather than turning on what I affectionately refer to as “Mom TV.” "

"The real goal of the "forcible" rape clause: conservatives are looking at the end game. They envision a time when abortion is illegal in all states, except in cases of rape, incest, or life of the mother. If a rape has to be "forcible" to count, women will have to provide proof that they were forced: bruising, trauma, injury. Since a woman won't know she's pregnant until weeks after the rape, she'll have to have gathered that proof (like a rape kit with photos) at time of conception. This will effectively block all but the most proactive victims of violent rape from receiving abortions.

"The "legitimate" rape idea is even worse: if you're pregnant, it wasn't actually rape, therefore, no abortion!"

"Even though it's incredibly important that individuals have the right to make decisions about their lives, to suggest that "choice" is somehow the explanation of things that are wrong with the world, or to suggest that "choice" alone will solve the problems, is to significantly diminish complex lived experiences."